Chapter 2

As the stream of concubines and children poured through the transporter, they immediately looked for their sponsors and fell into military formation behind them. Each concubine stood behind and either to the left or right of their sponsor, while their children formed a straight line behind their mothers, with the youngest being closest. To say the Marines were stunned by how organized the members of the militia were would be a vast understatement. They stood in formation silently, ignoring the chaos caused by the non-militia sponsors and their concubines, who were still talking and milling around.

A loud smack, followed by a scream of pain, drew everyone's attention. One of the wrestlers who had been picked up loomed over a concubine of his that he had just knocked to the deck. He reached down and slapped her again. When he went to slap her a third time, Jared's discipline broke and he started to move over to intervene. He only got a step before Kyle's hand wrapped around his arm, pulling him back. Looking angrily back at his friend, he slumped when Kyle shook his head. However, the fourth slap and cry of pain was too much for Kyle, who stepped in front of the militia formation and turned to face them.

"Listen up," he bellowed at the top of his lungs, causing even the Marines watching the room to spin and listen, even though he was not addressing them, "most of you are horrified by what that pathetic excuse for a man is doing to that defenseless little girl. Well get over it! She gave away her freedom when she stepped through the transporter, now she's nothing but a worthless concubine. He is absolutely within his rights to prove how manly he is by beating her! Concubines are not people, they're property, and sponsors can do anything they want to them. Why should anyone interfere with his childish amusement? He's not doing anything wrong. No one cares about the mental health of slaves, so who cares that the severely traumatized concubine will be expected to try and raise mentally healthy kids. Just because the mother is mentally broken and terrified does not mean the kids she raises will be in any way scarred by how damaged she is."

Turning back to the wrestler, who was standing there, mouth open and face bright red, his arm raised for another blow, Kyle said in a falsely sweet voice, "Please continue your lesson of how concubines should be treated. All the officers in this room who decide things like watch rotation, who gets to walk point on dangerous missions and who polices body parts after an engagement will definitely be interested in the type of men under their command."

While Kyle never even hinted the man should stop, the clear ridicule and threat in his voice caused the wrestler to back down. He did not apologize to the woman he had been beating, but he also did not hit her again. A lieutenant who had walked into the room just before Kyle had spoken up applauded him.

"Excellent speech," he said. "That man is entirely correct and delivered my speech better than I could. Concubines are slaves, and can be treated however the sponsor wants. However, if your concubines are miserable and terrified, then you will not have a happy household. Trust me, it's far more rewarding to have beautiful women light up the room with their happy smiles when you come in and throw themselves at you, thrilled to see you and eager to show you how much they missed you with their hot bodies, than to have sullen, terrified women kneeling on the floor afraid you will notice them. Having absolute control over slaves is a power trip and a test of character. How you handle it says a lot about you. While beating slaves is absolutely allowed, even killing them if you can come up with a valid reason, be careful. Having that level of disregard for your property degrades your CAP score. Your commanding officer can order an AI to retest you if you commit an offense that merits it in their eyes. If you fail because of your power-tripping abuse, then you will become a concubine and most likely killed 48 hours later."

Looking around the room, he added, "Also, the prime duty of a concubine is to breed. The more time they spend in a medtube getting broken bones fixed, the less time they have to get pregnant and raise the resulting children. Make no mistake: it's yours', and theirs', jobs to bring up the next generation of fighters for this war. No one believes we will be able to beat the Swarm in only one generation, so that's why children are so important. It will be severely frowned upon if you can't raise high CAP children to join us in the fight. To do that, you need mentally stable concubines and a supportive environment. Think carefully about this, you are not just fighting a battle; you are fighting the opening shots in a war of extermination against a race that only sees us as food. There is no mercy, no prisoners of war and no negotiation, only killing or dying. There are more of them and they breed much faster, so we need every fighter we can get. It is your duty to the survival of the human race to raise healthy, mentally fit children to join the fight and help us win!" The lieutenant paused as the Marines and sponsors cheered and yelled "Hu-rah!"

"Now while I would never deliberately choose troops for a suicide mission based on the number of times their concubines had wound up in medtubes, their names would most likely be the first to pop in my head since they keep coming up in reports and I'm familiar with them." Turning to leave, he warned, "Don't make me familiar with your name from negative reports."

Both Kyle's and the Marine lieutenant's speeches had obviously had an impact, as there was an open circle around the wrestler, and he was obviously being ostracized. Looking at Jared, Kyle said rather smugly, "You see the power of words? That man now looks like an idiot and hopefully feels like one also. With any luck, he had also realized that his abuse of concubines has consequences beyond just fluffing his ego. Time will tell."

Jared slapped him on the shoulder, "You're right as usual," he said.

Jen also broke ranks and went over to Kyle, her eyes were glowing with pride. "My hero," she said and gave him a kiss that left him weak-kneed.

Sergeant Taylor was thrilled when they were released to grab some chow and call it a day. He had never been a fan of pickup duty, and this pickup had been about six beers stressful. As he started to dig in, Sergeant Maxwell, who had been doing pickups for the other transport, sat down and joined him with a mournful sigh.

Seeing Taylor's raised eyebrow, he said, "You are fucking lucky you weren't stuck with my squad, that fucking pickup I did today was the worst bunch of fucktards ever..."

Welcoming the distraction from his own thoughts, Taylor said, "Tell me about it, I could use a good laugh."

"You are far more likely to cry when you hear what I am responsible for inflicting on the Confederacy," Maxwell replied with another sigh.

"It started off routinely enough, your basic diner at lunchtime scenario. Our targets were there, but apparently the AI that tested them originally must have had a few screws loose when it assigned scores.

"The first sign of trouble was when this mousy little Hispanic girl came up to the transporter. She had two tough-looking Hispanic boys with gang tattoos and bad attitudes trailing her. She was evasive when I asked if she chose them willingly. Finally, I gave up and asked if they would be her concubines. When they agreed, and she agreed to sponsor them, I told them to strip naked because they are concubines, but they refused. When I told them that refusal to follow orders results in death, they got really pissed but complied.

"A few minutes later, one of my Marines came up and told me he had heard crying in a nearby booth and gone to investigate. He had found the Hispanic girl's best friend and her brother, upset because the gang bullies forced them to give up their spots. I authorized them as extras since I'm pretty damn sure the gangbangers will be dead by tomorrow and the Hispanic girl will need to refill her harem. I made sure to inform the duty officer about the gang members and to have the AI keep a careful watch on them.

"Then there was the pair of fourteen-year-old, virgin boys. They had no idea what to do, and wound up picking the first chicks that offered them pussy without even glancing at the CAP cards or test-driving them. They are still better off than the three muscle-headed jocks that were already drunk at lunchtime who grabbed nothing but empty-headed eye-candy. I swear, they passed up any girl who had two brain cells that still talked to each other.

"One of our targets turned out to be a flaming gay man who threw an epic hissy fit when we told him he really should bring at least one female to get pregnant. His theatrics when told he would have to have straight sex at least once a year were utterly eclipsed by the tears and histrionics of his friends when they find out one had to be left behind. God, I hated listening to that. I came within a hair's breadth of stunning the lot of them and leaving them behind just for the sake of my sanity! I did wind up stunning the guy he left behind who was throwing a loud bitch-fit.

"The last two targets were just embarrassments. One was the proverbial mother's boy living in his mother's basement at the age of 45. He was worse than the fourteen-year-olds when it came to choosing concubines. Finally, there was the archetypical go-getter businesswoman bitch. She was so cold and bitchy that people were actively avoiding her when she went near them. Hell, several people who had been begging the others to take them actually turned her down! I'm pretty sure every single person who would have made a good concubine was left behind. God, what a cluster-fuck! It took twice as long as it should have and the sponsors are the worst I have ever seen. You know how many pickups I've done, so that is really saying something," Sergeant Maxwell finished, taking a long pull from his beer.

"While I agree that sounds like the worst bunch of fuck-nuts ever, my pickup was no picnic either," Sergeant Taylor said. "In fact, my pickup was the exact opposite, they were frighteningly fucking competent. In the bar, the usual Darwin-award candidate made himself known and we were suddenly surrounded by people with guns ... protecting us! That was a fucking shocker! They turned out to be a pro-Confederacy militia that had formed to ensure the local sponsors would get picked up by keeping Earth First and other idiots away. They had a fucking ream of paperwork that included concubine contracts, guardianship papers for every dependent and sponsor and even wills that dictated who would get their concubines if they died, with multiple designees listed in order of preference. I've never seen anything like it, even the AI was thrown off, but accepted it.

"Hell, when we went to do the dependent pickup their fucking concubines tricked us into standing in the middle of a wide-open kill zone! They had gunners in foxholes covering us and snipers in a tree line ready to drop us if we did not give the proper password!

"Even more clever, when the sponsors gave us the passwords, which was a long string of random words in different languages, we were told to make absolutely sure we said the whole password thing was bullshit. Those were the actual passwords, NOT what was written on the paper. God, I not ashamed to admit I almost crapped my pants when I found out what the snipers had pointed our way. They were fucking Barrett M107.50 caliber sniper rifles! Those fucking things are made to stop light armored vehicles! If they had started shooting, we would have been dead meat."

"Jesus fucking Christ!" Maxwell said in shock.

"The house that we could hear voices coming from ... it was a fucking trap. The whole house was rigged to explode and the voices came from fucking baby monitors linked to ones in the underground shelter where the children actually were. The barn where the dependents were sheltering was a fucking fortress, the stall where the door to their shelter was guarded by a God-damned warhorse, and the actual door was so thick it would have taken explosives to get through it.

"The damn sponsors had equipped and trained their concubines to fight a war! The concubines had been given military grade weapons. Besides the most powerful sniper rifles available to the military, they had fully automatic shotguns and the assault rifles, which looked like standard M-4's, turned out to have been converted into Beowulfs, which fire .50 caliber ammo! God, with the layout and firepower those six concubines had, they probably could have taken out a SEAL assault team." Taylor took a long pull on his beer.

Just then, Lisa, the concubine who had been talking to him at the dependent pickup, walked by. The mouthful of beer he had just swigged almost shot across the table when Taylor noticed her. When she went to blow him a kiss, he could not help but cringe a little. With a merry laugh, she walked on, while the two Marines stared after her, admiring her figure but somewhat awed by her.

"Could you imagine having someone like that as a concubine?" Taylor asked. "Shit, if one of them ever goes rogue, there will be a bloodbath!"

Little did they know a similar conversation was going on in the bridge as they spoke.

"Sir, I think you should see this," Lieutenant Rogeou said to Captain Holzetti sounding a little worried. After what he had seen in the transporter room, the sponsors, concubines and children lined up with military precision standing apart from the scrum, and the excellent speech one of them had made, he had decided to do a little digging.

"What is it, son?" Captain Holzetti asked, mildly annoyed at being interrupted when he was preparing for departure.

"AI, please display the names and skills of the individuals I asked you to store in memory," the lieutenant requested.

"Affirmative," the AI responded, quickly creating a display screen nearby with the requested list showing.

Samantha Redding, US Army, retired after 20 years, combat medic with four combat tours of duty, EMT paramedic certified, 6 years experience, bodyguard certified, license to carry concealed weapons, 2 years krav maga training.

Michael Ferns, US Navy Explosive Ordinance Disposal, retired after 10 years, certified demolitions expert, certified fireworks handler, certified bodyguard, license to carry concealed weapons, 4 years krav maga training.

John Forscyth, sergeant, LA county SWAT team, position- sniper, 10 years on police force, license to carry concealed weapons, machine gun permit, NRA certified range coach, Master's degree in criminal justice, black belt tai kwon do...

Lisa DeRose, US Marine Corps, unarmed combat instructor, retired after 8 years, 12 years krav maga training, black belt hapkido, certified bodyguard, defensive driving training, license to carry concealed weapons, machine gun permit.

Jill Finch, certified massage therapist, master's degree in kinesthology, license to carry concealed weapons, 1 year training in krav maga.

Carl Waters, US Army airborne and Green Beret, retired 20 years, machine gun permit, NRA certified range coach, black belt aikido, license to carry concealed weapons, licensed pilot.

"Jesus Christ, those are some serious skills!" the captain said in a surprised and awed tone.

The lieutenant then dropped the real bombshell, "I know, and those are just some of the concubines! Most of the rest have similar lists of skills."

"What? You have got to be fucking kidding me! Those are concubines?" the captain was shocked. "AI, show me the CAP scores of the individuals listed on the screen," he ordered.

Samantha Redding 6.1

Michael Ferns 5.9

John Forscyth 6.3

Lisa DeRose 6.2

Jill Finch 5.9

Carl Waters 6.1

"Holy shit," he whispered. "The militia members sure didn't mess around looking for the best concubines possible and getting them trained even further, did they?"

"Sir, I had a thought," the lieutenant said. "You remember that briefing last week? The one about Demeter and the planetary militia they were forming? I was thinking these guys would be perfect as instructors for that colony."

"Huh. That's a pretty good idea. Demeter is only about two weeks from Frigia at full speed. Let me kick it upstairs and see what happens."

Corporal Rana Harris was able to wait almost a full day before lust overcame her and she tracked down the giant from the pickup. Doctor Solomon Miles, aka Titan. She could not believe how hot he was, and the fact she was positively dainty compared to him was a huge turn on. Before her pickup, she had been a short woman and had hated having to look up to talk to men. After the two rapes, she felt she needed to be as big and strong as a Marine to feel safe. Now her dream had come true and she was the same two meter height as the augmented Marine men. Sadly, like many wishes when they are fulfilled, she realized something about herself. She liked being smaller than her partner. She liked having him tuck her head under his chin when he held her. Suddenly, she felt very strange and uncertain. Her body still loved and craved sex, but being the same height as the man felt ... wrong ... somehow. She was having trouble coming to terms with it and it was messing things up. It had already screwed up her harem, with her uncertainty being taken out on her two male concubines.

Thinking back, she remembered how things had gotten really uncomfortable with her harem by the time she had received a request for her to volunteer to be reassigned as an unarmed combat instructor to the Ares. The request had come from a Dux Hansen, who she had never met or even heard of. She also had to ask the AI what the hell rank a dux was. Finding out it was the Civil Service equivalent of a fairly high-ranking general, she became very interested as to how a rank-busted, sergeant-turned-corporal, had become known to someone in that lofty a position from another branch. Finding out the request had come through him from a concubine she had met and befriended almost a year ago definitely piqued her interest. How often does a concubine make a request to a general regarding a corporal and have successfully have said general move Heaven and Earth to make it happen?

However, she had not bothered to find out how a concubine headed to Quay was able to convince the highest-ranking Civil Service officer in Earthat to ask her to transfer to a ship in the Frigia system. While curious, she had not cared. It had been the chance she had been looking for to start over. Ever since she had been busted in rank for injuring that jackass rapist Brian, she had been looking for a change of scenery. With only the mildest regrets, she had turned her harem over to the local Civil Service officer and jumped on the Heracles to do a pickup rotation until the ship reached Frigia, where she would transfer to the Ares. Despite some pressure from above, she had firmly refused to choose a new harem, fearing the same thing would happen as before. She had looked half-heartedly, but no one interested her at any of the pickups.

Then she had done the bar pickup and everything had changed. The moment she had laid eyes on Titan, she had been lost. She blushed when she remembered Sergeant Taylor having to scold her to get her to refocus on her assignment. All she had been able to think about had been that man. Even during the pickup, when she was supposed to be on alert and helping the female sponsors choose wisely, her eyes had constantly drifted back to Titan and the women he was test driving. The desire to be the one under him had driven her crazy, and when he locked eyes with her as he was shooting into another woman, she had actually orgasmed! After finding out he was also being assigned to Frigia, she knew she had to make her move. She had given him the first night to be with his concubines, now she was determined to have a turn herself.

After a bit of searching, Rana found Titan relaxing in the mess hall after a sponsor lecture. Without hesitation, she went over to him and wormed herself under his arm, hoping he would not reject her. His shocked look had quickly changed to one of pleasure and lust when he had looked down and realized who it was cuddling with him. She loved the feeling of tilting her head up to get kissed by him. When they broke the kiss, both were smiling happily and she knew she was in love. Their happy moment was interrupted by one of the other sponsors who had a question for Titan. Rana barely listened to either the question or the response, she was just glorying in being able to tuck herself under a man's arm again and feel protected. It was the feeling she had been missing since she had been augmented.